My Lord and Spymaster

He took over the space between them and filled it with his breath and his heartbeat and the heat that was coming off his body. He smelled of sweat and anger. Totally male. She kept having these awkward moments with the Captain.

“I wouldn’t keep black dealings in the company books,” he said. “You know that. You went up to the roofs, trying to clear me. Because of what’s between us.”

“There’s nothing between us.” And that was a right old lie.

The gather of her dress brushed his arm when she shrugged. That set off another shudder. It behooved her to walk away from him, some time or another, and get through that door there. Soon, like.

“You didn’t find what you were looking for, did you? As far as you’re concerned, I could still be Cinq.”

She could have told him, to the shilling, his return on capital for every ship in his fleet, and she didn’t have one idea in her head how to go on with this particular conversation. “You could be.”

“I’m not. You’re going to prove it. While you were larking about on the roof, I went through your charts and calculations—”

“The ones you stole from my office.”

“The ones I borrowed.”

“You—”

“Put it aside.” He made an impatient sweep of fingers against her cheek, half caress, half comment. “Would it do any good if I apologized? Would you be less angry? Would it wipe away what I had to do? We’re finished with that.”

No, we aren’t. “You took my damn lemon drops.”

“And we all enjoyed them. Now listen. You have four dates the War Office lost secrets. You cut your list of blood-thirsty, murdering scum in half, because most of them didn’t have ships in London all four dates. I take it Kennett Shipping did.”

He was waiting for an answer, so she said, “Yes.”

“If I get you all those dates, the dates the secrets went missing, can you find Cinq?”

That’s half of what I need. Only half. Sometimes at night, in her dreams, she saw ships slipping across her maps—black ships the size of her thumb, headed for France, carrying secrets, snickering at her.

“Jess . . .”

“The Service doesn’t have those dates. It’s Military Intelligence. Colonel Reams.” Reams wore bright scarlet regimentals and had a big office at the Horse Guards and he made the dregs of the docks look like gentlemen. Reams will eat me alive if I make one tiny mistake.

“I know. We’ll deal with Reams. Think about how to do it.” He took a minute to read her face. “You’ve already come up with a way to get to him, haven’t you? Fine. You’ll tell me what you’re planning and I’ll help you.”

I wish you could. I wish I had you at my back, holding the ropes, keeping me safe. “I don’t know why you’d help me.”

“That’s something else for you to think about.” He turned and took a long step to pound on the door, telling Trevor to come open it and let her into the rest of the house. “You’re going to trust me, Jess. You’re halfway to it now.” His voice rumbled and buzzed in her bones, clinging to her senses like toffee. The very last of her anger leached away. What topped up the foam on the beer was how much she wanted to do just that. Trust him.

The key turned in the lock. Trevor hadn’t been far away.

“When you talk to your father, tell him to get you out of England. You’re not safe here. And stay next to the fire so you don’t freeze to death.”

PAPA stomped around the study they’d given him, expressing himself. He’d been at it a while. Seemed like it was her day for getting yelled at by angry men.

“Does tha ask me? Does tha? Am I in the Bay of Bengal that tha’ can’t send word?”

“I—”

“What use is it to me or to anyone, thee dying in thy blood on Eaton’s doorstep? Eh? Where am I then, when tha breaks thy neck like a chicken?”

“I was careful.”

The windows held a streaky view of rain at sunset, seen through iron bars. Pretty soon, they’d draw the curtains and keep the night out.

“Careful? I swear by God, if I hear tha’s been skiperting across the roofs again, I’ll put thee on the next ship out of England. I won’t have it.”

“Yes, Papa.” He’d about finished yelling at her, which was a relief to both of them and likely everyone else in the house.

“Pitney don’t need another idiot to look after, him having the whole London office for that purpose and half the fools at Customs and the Board of Trade.” She was sitting on the low stool by the fire. Papa put his hand on her head, as if she was still a child. “Tha’s to stop taking daft risks.”

He was worrying about her. Papa was locked up, and any hour of any day they could take him off to Newgate Prison and lay charges against him. He wasted his time worrying about her. “I’m careful.”

“Oh, that’s a reet comfort, that is. My Jess says she’s careful. Where’s thy common sense, lass? If tha’ need must break into Eaton’s, hire a man. There’s sneak thieves on every street corner. It’s not like we don’t have the brass.”

Might as well shout her business from the rooftops as hire a thief. Not a one of them honest. “Yes, Papa.”

“Or bribery. There’s a mort of trouble saved in this world by simple bribery. Happen that’s how someone got his fingers into our books to plant the poison. It’ll turn out to be one of the clerks and a little bribery.”

“Happen you’re right.”

He set his knuckle on her cheekbone, telling her all the things he wasn’t going to put into words. “Tha’s a gradely bruise forming here. Very fetching.”

“I’ve been avoiding mirrors. But it’s not important.”

“Not important to tell thy father tha’d been hurt? I must hear it from Pitney. He comes and tells me and looks ashamed the whole time. Tha’s put him between two loyalties, Jessie. It wasn’t well done of thee.”

That was another of the demons clawing at her. She had to see Pitney get grayer and more haggard every day he walked into the office. Pitney worried about her. “I’m safe enough. Did you know I have bodyguards trailing after me? I swagger around town like that Roman emperor everyone was aiming knives at. Caesar.”

“That’ll be some of that expensive education I bought thee.”

“So it is. I’m hoping for a lull in folks attacking me, what with these vigorous men following me everywhere. And I moved out of the hotel. I’ve gone into hiding, like.” She didn’t mention she was hiding in the Captain’s house and that he might be Cinq. A delicate omission, her governess used to call that sort of thing. “You wouldn’t believe how cautious I’m being.”

She’d made him smile. “Tha hasna taken care since the day tha was’t born.” Papa squeezed her shoulder and let go and walked across to close the curtains. “The Foreign Office came by again.”

“Ah.”

The Foreign Office had got worried about the Whitby holdings in the East, afraid Jess Whitby might absentmindedly marry some Frenchman or Russian. It was all nods and winks and nobody saying anything right out, but the bottom line was, if she married some reliable Englishman they picked out and gave him half the company, Papa walked free. How long he’d live after that was anyone’s guess. Nobody more ruthless than diplomats.

Except the military. Colonel Reams didn’t wink and hint. The colonel made his proposal right to her face, all hoarse and threatening and spitting a little when he got excited about the whole business. He was another one promising to set Papa free, the minute the ink was dry on a marriage license.

They must all think she was a right idiot. “Colonel Reams dropped by the warehouse.”

“Ah.” Papa settled the curtains, one against the other, closing off the draft, making it snug. “Bidding, then.”

“Bidding.” On her. The Military and the Foreign Office were watching each other, and both of them watching her.